False Prophets

Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many (Matthew 24:11).

Josephus tells us that during the siege of Jerusalem, “The tyrannical zealots who ruled the city suborned ‘many false prophets’ to declare that aid would be given to the people from heaven. This was done to prevent them from attempting to desert, and to inspire confidence in God” (“Jewish Wars”, book 6, chapter 5, sections 2 & 3).

In Matthew 24:11 Jesus was not talking about false Messiahs, false Christs, people who claim to be Jesus. Those individuals Jesus had already condemned in 24:5. No, these that Jesus now spoke of are those who claim to be the mouthpiece of God and can foretell future events; those who give false hope or who turn people away from Jesus Christ and toward those who can ‘save’ them, i.e. the Romans, the Antichrist, etc.

During the siege of Jerusalem, Josephus tells us there were many who supposedly spoke for God and encouraged the people to hold on to the city, help was on the way. But they were slaughtered by the hundreds of thousands. We know they were false prophets, and that help would never come because Jesus predicted it 40 years earlier.

In the coming Tribulation there will also rise up false prophets - not false Messiahs or false Christs, but false prophets who will turn the hearts of the people to the Antichrist as their ‘savior’. They will be false prophets because they will partner with the great false prophet who will be the sidekick to the Antichrist. They will be false prophets because they will hunt down and kill those who come to faith in Jesus Christ through the preaching of the Gospel by the 144,000 and the 2 great witnesses. Anyone who claims to speak for God yet turns people away from Jesus Christ, the Gospel, and the Christian faith is a false prophet. What’s disturbing is there are such men and women in the pulpits of America, Europe, Africa, and Asia today.

The word ‘deceive’ means to stray away, to wander, to be seduced. In Revelation 9:13-21, the 6th angel will sound his trumpet and a hoard of 100 million warriors will be released to torment the people of the earth, that they should not worship demons, and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk. And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts. They did not repent of their murders, sorceries, sexual immorality, theft. ‘Sorceries’ is a translation of pharmakia or pharmakone, from which we get our English word pharmacy - drugs. The dangers of drug addiction include the destruction of the mind, body, and soul. Satan uses drug addiction to enslave people, to bring them under his power, to keep them under his power, and to destroy them.

“Holy Spirit, open our eyes and ears to the false prophets of our day, to expose them, and to warn people of the poisonous propaganda Satan preaches through them. And help us to support those who work with the addicts to bring them out of their addictions by bringing them to Jesus. In His name I ask. Amen.”

Pastor